The Influence of Park Chung Hee’s Motion Picture Law on Korean Society

Abstract

The term ‘Korean wave’ is broadly defined as the huge achievement of South Korean cultural economy industries around the world. It represented a big milestone when South Korea’s movie “Parasite” won the Oscar for Best Picture, which was the first movie from non-English speaking country to win such award in the history. While lots of Korean filmmakers have been trying to produce their own flims for more than 100 years, the cinema of South Korea officially started in 1945 and have been strongly influenced by events and political forces. This paper mainly studies the content and influence of the Motion Picture Law (MPL) issued during Park Chung Hee era in the 1960s and later strict censorship and propaganda in 1970s under Park’s government control. It is worth exploring why the Korean film industry can achieve such achievements, and what role the MPL played in it. The experience and lessons are worthy of reference. This paper briefly reviews the development history of Korean film from a historical perspective, introduces the legal content and the historical background, and then discusses and analyzes its influence on the positive and negative sides at that time. Looking back at the twists and turns of the Korean movie industry is also of great significance to the development of other countries.